Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s frustration with CTU unilaterally cancelling classes at Chicago Public Schools portends what will happen across Illinois should pro-Union constitutional amendment pass in November, and if the PRO Act becomes law nationwide

From the desk of John Lopez: I never thought I would be thankful for events in the city of Chicago.

But this week’s unilateral, possibly illegal action by the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) to hold a vote of its members to decide if they will return to in-person learning after the Christmas Holidays break gives mainstream voters across the state, and possibly the nation, what happens when Labor Unions have too much power.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot is learning the consequences of CTU first hand.

Seeing the chaos created for Chicago city officials, parents and especially Chicago Public Schools (CPS) children shows many unintended consequences giving organized labor too much power.

Actions like CTU could become nationwide of Big Labor union bosses get their way with voters on November 8, or nationwide if the Democrats find a way to pass the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act this year.

Starting with November 8 and as previously reported on McHenry County Blog, the supermajority Democrats with Republican crossover votes in the Illinois General Assembly (ILGA) last year passed a joint resolution placing the following amendment to the Illinois Constitution on the ballot for voter approval:

SECTION 25. WORKERS’ RIGHTS

(a) Employees shall have the fundamental right to organize and to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing for the purpose of negotiating wages, hours, and working conditions, and to protect their economic welfare and safety at work. No law shall be passed that interferes with, negates, or diminishes the right of employees to organize and bargain collectively over their wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment and work place safety, including any law or ordinance that prohibits the execution or application of agreements between employers and labor organizations that represent employees requiring membership in an organization as a condition of employment.

(b) The provisions of this Section are controlling over those of Section 6 of Article VII.

From Senate Joint Resolution Constitutional Amendment 11, passed in May 2021 by the Illinois General Assembly

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On the surface, the proposed Amendment One all Illinois voters will see at the top of the ballot this fall, is to outlaw Illinois ever become a right-to-work state, as 27 states, including nearly all of Illinois’ neighbors, have enacted going back to the 1960s.

But read the wording, particularly the part about “working conditions”.

Isn’t that what CTU is doing, forcing closure of CPS in-person classes?

Unions over the past 50 years abandoned their core mission of providing representation for its members through collective bargaining and contract administration.

Amendment One, plus the federal PRO Act, which currently remains stalled in the U.S. Senate due to the same 3 Democratic holdouts from Arizona and Virginia, combined, will give unions across the state the right to do “sympathy strikes” to show “labor solidarity”.

And the Biden Administration wants unions to have this kind of power.

Imagine if, under the PRO Act, teachers unions in downstate heeded a call from the National Education Association and/or the American Federation of Teachers for all members to walk out of their schools to help CTU force remote learning statewide on children and their families, again, due to COVID when the science proves students, and teachers are safer in schools opposed to poorly ventilated homes.

Such action is currently illegal. The PRO Act would legalize it.

And taking a union to court if Amendment One passes!? Forget it, as unions, under the proposed Amendment One, will rightfully point their actions are constitutional.

Who’d have thought Mayor Lightfoot’s frustrations in January of 2022 would be the best advertisement to defeat the completely unnecessary Amendment One in November?

May voters all “remember in November”.